adventures in family, faith, and Down syndrome

Zoo Day, Take 3

by Maggie on August 14, 2016

Sitting in my new writing space, I’m watching the last of our summer sunshine slip through the treetops. I went back to work last week, but tomorrow, all of our teachers report. The girls will go back to their Mimi Daycare. John will be up and dressed in the morning. Our routine will begin to settle in.

Our annual traditions have come and gone for the year, but as I wrap up the loose ends of a summer vacation, I realized that I didn’t write down enough of those moments. After all, I write so that my girls can remember – when I don’t write, they have to rely on my poor photography skills and fuzzy memory to piece together their childhood.

So I write.

Ellie and I had our annual Zoo Day much earlier this summer. Although, it’s worth noting that the traditional date, which is the day after I finish my school year, flew by without our normal outing. At the end of the school year, I had a brief bout of food poisoning, and we moved, and I had to hire some positions unexpectedly… and soon it was mid-June with no Zoo trip. So Ellie stomped into the kitchen, grabbed a permanent marker, and scrawled “ZOO DAY” on the calendar.

How does one argue with permanent marker in almost five-year-old handwriting?

It’s funny, I don’t know if it is just because she has grown so much over the last year, or if it was timing, or just me, but this trip felt so different for me than in the past. In year one, she was still in a stroller and pull-ups; year two brought an obsession with zebras and the bathrooms. This year, she wanted two things: Dippin’ Dots and a ride on the trolley.

She loves to get a zoo map and navigates through the zoo like any good tourist would do:

By far, her favorite animal is still the zebra…

reunited and it feels so good

But she also got a great kick out of the river otters this year. She even picked out a river otter toy from the gift shop this year. She lingered longer at each exhibit, too. Since she can now read, she took great joy in examining the placards in front of each animal. Things that she was once scared of, no longer made her panic. I, the proud mother, happily snapped pictures of my brave girl, conquering the dreaded kangaroo pouch, the swamp, and that silly bird house.

We took our annual selfie on the trolley…

And she made point to stand in every. single. one. of these look-through thingies (do they have a name???):

I made her wait until the end of the day to get her Dippin’ Dots, even though she complained pretty much every five minutes until she got them. We sat alongside the big fountain this year. She enjoyed watching the people go by, and even made a new little friend with the girl sitting by her family eating Dippin’ Dots across the way.

Our Zoo Days are usually long – with a breakfast and several hours wandering the familiar paths. This year, she had her fill in about two hours. After that, she asked to go back home to Daddy and Tessa. Our stop at the gift shop this year though, was considerably more difficult. She is a thoughtful little lady, and after much deliberation over which item Daddy would most like to display on his desk at school, she settled on this keeper of a mug that I know John can’t wait to show off to his colleagues:

(She doesn’t need to know that I had to dig it out of the back of our tupperware cabinet just to take this picture.)

A little older, a little calmer, a lot of sweet memories made with my sweet-ish girl. Who knows how many more years of zoo days I can talk her in to, so I will continue to soak in every one. 🙂